HAVE YOU EVER seen the Boston Marathon on television, with thousands of runners madly dashing for the front once the gun goes off? Well, that’s how S gauge operators will be acting when they get a look at the new Fairbanks-Morse Train Master from American Models. Surprisingly, it took almost half a century for S […]
Sample page from Field Guide to Modern Diesel Locomotives. Sample page from Field Guide to Modern Diesel Locomotives. Greg McDonnell’s Field Guide to Modern Diesel Locomotives, from the publishers of TRAINS Magazine, picks up where Louis Marre’s Diesel Locomotives: The First 50 Years (Kalmbach 1995) leaves off. McDonnell includes histories and spotting features of Electro-Motive […]
Say you’re an engineer running a multi-unit diesel consist on a freight train. During the trip, it becomes necessary to remove the lead unit because of a grade-crossing entanglement, some mechanical problem, or to give to another (underpowered) train. No problem – the second unit can lead as well as the first, so you resume […]
Leslie and Nathan may sound like a dull couple from the ‘burbs, but they’re actually the first chairs in railroading’s horn section. The diesel locomotive horn section, that is. Many of today’s train-watchers recognize a railroad by the sound of its diesels’ horns. It’s only natural since sound is a strong memory-jogging sense, second only […]
Locomotive classification lights Locomotive classification lights — colored flags by day, lights by night — were once used throughout North American railroading. U.S. railroads used a single light and outer lens, with colored lenses in between that could be changed as needed. Canadian roads used three separate lights; on diesels these were often located near […]
OFTEN SIMPLE IS better, and that’s exactly the case with the Hooter horn from QSI. The Hooter is a compact digital horn and bell designed as a drop-in replacement horn for Lionel postwar diesels, although it can be used in any diesel from any era. There are no diesel engine sounds, just a horn and […]
IN MY MIND, the pinnacle of diesel locomotion is the General Motors SD40-2. Back when I would trudge through snowbanks in Wyoming and North Dakota to snap pictures of trains, it was the SD40-2 that got my heart pounding, rather than endless streams of GP-whatevers. The SD40-2 is big and burly. The long fore and […]
THANKS TO MTH, hobbyists around the country are coming up with clever ways to integrate subways and elevated transit lines into their layouts. The latest entry in the subway sweepstakes is a set of O gauge R-36 cars. The first of 424 of the eye-catching blue-and-white R-36 cars began arriving in New York City in […]
CAN THERE EVER BE too many O gauge Santa Fe F units on the market? Probably not. General Motors cranked out these diesels by the thousands, and both the high and mighty lines, as well as scores of railroads you probably never heard of, used these trusty machines. As with New York Central Hudsons, the […]
Tower 55 HO GE ES44AC This superbly detailed model of a General Electric ES44AC heavyduty road diesel is the initial offering in a new line of HO plastic locomotives from Tower 55. Tower 55 is a subsidiary of Overland Models, a manufacturer of brass locomotives and rolling stock. The Explorer-series locomotive reviewed here includes an […]
Atlas HO scale EMD MP15 Here’s a great looking, smooth-running model of Electro-Motive Division’s versatile MP15 heavy-duty yard switcher. At first glance it may look like any other EMD switcher, but this one is a hauler capable of moving up to 42 free-rolling cars on straight, level track. Atlas offers the MP15 in a Silver-series […]
THE Q1 DUPLEX 4-6-4-4 is a footnote to the Pennsylvania Railroad’s efforts to improve the performance of its M1-class locomotives. The railroad’s question: “Could a duplex-drive locomotive perform better than the railroad’s M1-class locomotive?” The answer was “yes, but…” The Q1 was completed in May 1942. Unfortunately, wartime restrictions limited the development of the new […]
